There they go again.

The American Health Care Act (AHCA) fizzled in March after the Congressional Budget Office predicted bleak outcomes, including an increase of 24 million in the number of uninsured Americans over the next 10 years and untenable cuts in federal funding to states.

Unfortunately, the AHCA is back with its plan to scrap Medicaid coverage for millions of adults and slash funding to state programs. Worse, this new version includes amendments that would allow Colorado to opt out of protections for the estimated 1.2 million Coloradans with pre-existing conditions, or to drop the requirement that plans provide the full slate of benefits. If state plans no longer had to meet the essential health benefits requirement, consumers would no longer have the protections of annual and lifetime limits. Costs for people with serious health needs would skyrocket.

A majority of Coloradans support retaining the ACA, consistent with national views, but those in Congress who ran on repeal can’t seem to leave it alone.  A vote by the U.S. House of Representatives on the AHCA could come as soon as tomorrow. As was true regarding the last version of the AHCA, if the bill were to pass, a wealthy few would benefit at the expense of our Colorado communities, and all of us with identified health conditions could pay much more.

Call your representative – especially Reps. Coffman and Buck, who are key players – to tell them to vote no on the AHCA. Let’s put this issue to rest: Coloradans want affordable access to health care, whatever their health needs, and the AHCA would take us in the opposite direction.

– Bethany Pray